Sometimes, when the information on which we base our stories is inaccurate, mistakes end up in
print.

It happened on Tuesday in a significant story, and I apologize for that. Here’s what
happened:

We reported that former Gov. Bob Taft’s four criminal convictions for ethics violations had been
expunged. The information was derived from the Ohio Inspector General’s office and came to light
when it released the results of an investigation into the 2005 “Coingate” investment scandal at the
Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation.

Public Affairs editor Darrel Rowland wrote the story after reviewing the report and conducting
interviews with Inspector General Randall K. Meyer and his staff, including Carl Enslen, who
handles media relations.

“Mr. Meyer was very clear that his report included the names of all those who were charged,
except those whose records were expunged. He and Mr. Enslen emphasized that they were not allowed
to disclose information about the expunged cases. However, they both sympathized with the dilemma
of providing an incomplete report. At some point they mentioned that the expungements happened
before Meyer was appointed to office by Gov. John Kasich,” Rowland said. “They agreed that
divulging the number of those with expunged records was proper: five.”

Rowland went through our archives and identified the five people who had criminal convictions as
part of Coingate but were not part of the report.

With this information, Rowland went to the ultimate authority — Taft himself — but the former
governor didn’t want to comment.

Rowland then checked the Franklin County Municipal Court’s online records system and found the
2005 conviction records were still there. Puzzled, Rowland contacted the IG’s office again, asking
why expunged records were still visible to the public. “Although the inspector general’s office
still would not confirm any names, there was an unmistakable sense of surprise that those records
were visible to the public,” Rowland said.

We published our story on Tuesday. Other news organizations followed up, and when they called
Taft’s attorney, Bill Meeks, he said that Taft never asked for nor received an expungement. When we
learned of this, Rowland contacted Enslen in the IG’s office, who said our story was accurate.

Except that it wasn’t. Later, the IG’s office acknowledged mistakes, blaming poor research by
staff members.

“Our problem was one of not doing complete searches, and I apologize for that ... we have to
take that responsibility as an entire office,” Enslen said, adding that those in the office have “
egg on our face, which we fully deserve.”

So do we.

With the benefit of hindsight, the fact that the Taft conviction records were online was the one
clue that it had not been expunged.

At the time, though, we knew the IG’s office — which had been investigating the case for years —
said the records of five people had been expunged. The IG’s office is an authoritative source, one
a reasonable person would believe and trust. Additionally, the fact that Taft didn’t indicate in
any way that the information was incorrect gave Rowland confidence that the information was
correct. This in no way suggests that Taft had any responsibility to help us get our facts right.
That’s our job, not his.

We could have called the Franklin County prosecutor’s office, but Rowland knew that no one there
could legally discuss an expungement. Prosecutor Ron O’Brien said as much later: “If he called me
and it’s expunged, technically, I am committing a crime if I divulge information contained in the
file ... but if it’s not, I can tell him that it’s still a public record.”

Asked whether a journalist should be able to trust the Inspector General’s office in matters
like this, O’Brien said yes. In this case, when Rowland called after finding the case listed on the
court’s website, O’Brien said the IG “should have said, ‘Hold on a second. We need to take another
look at that,’ particularly with Taft.”

In the end, we published incorrect information, and this difficult lesson will cause us to
improve our fact gathering and checking — even information coming from typically reliable sources.
As one old journalism saying goes: If your mother says she loves you, check it out.

Reader Barbara Reardon complained this week that we “hid” from readers the fact that the
Columbus Zoo levy request includes funds to offset the loss of the state rollback that had covered
12.5 percent of property taxes. That change to the tax law was proposed by Gov. John Kasich and
approved by the Republican-controlled legislature. It was part of the governor’s budget bill.

The zoo is requesting a 66.6 percent increase in the zoo property tax, but the net to property
owners is 105 percent because of the loss of the rollback.

A quick check of our archives shows we’ve reported that fact on at least seven occasions, and
even more frequently if you include the mentions in graphics.